Nekumonta, the strongest and bravest
chief of the Mohawks, wandered alone
in silence through the primeval forest.
The giant pines looked down upon
him with frowns ; the moss, dark and sodden on
the maples with rain, gave only a gloomy
greeting; the low beeches brushed against his
anxious face, and as he passed beneath them chilling
showers fell from their icy branches. Across
his path the snarling panther crept in sullen anger;
the frightened rabbit sped away to its nest under
the prostrate log; his brother the bear turned aside
and looked with sadness upon the troubled face of
Nekumonta as he hurried forward in the fast gathering
darkness. In all the forest no kindly sight came
to comfort the strong and brave chief of the Mohawks,
whose footsteps were heavy with fatigue
and whose heart was burdened with sorrow.

Through the cheerless, awful moons of snows
and frosts the plague had raged in the village of the
Mohawks. Many days and nights had the deathsong
been chanted for men, and women, and children. Few were untouched by the terrible sickness,
and the medicine men of the tribe had long
since seen the last of hoarded stores of herbs which
they used to put to flight the bad spirits. The
strong and brave Nekumonta and the light of his
wigwam, Shanewis, had watched the fires of life
go out many times. They knew that the Happy
Hunting-Grounds rang with the shouts and laughter
of their brothers and sisters; they sent them
messages by the echoing spirits and told them to
watch for their coming; but they were saddened
because their brothers and sisters had gone on the
long journey. The home of the Mohawks was full
of pleasure when the hunters and the women, the
young men, the maidens and the children worked
together in the fields of growing corn, or gathered
at night around the lodge-fire and listened to the
legends told by the aged.

At last the soft winds came, and their mellow
songs drove the cold and darkness from the valley.
With their first notes came hope—hope that when
the awful winter had gone to his home in the north
the plague would also take its flight from the
village.

Then Nekumonta's heart died, for Shanewis, the
light of his wigwam, was stricken, and from her
couch of furs smiled sadly as she whispered:
"Shanewis must fight with the bad spirits. She
would not leave Nekumonta, the strong and brave
one of the Mohawks, but her brothers and sisters
call to her from their long home."

For a moment Nekumonta stood erect, while
upon his face came the shadows of despair. As the
weary hunter loses control of his canoe and sees
below him the rapids that in terrible fury play
with their victim ere they hurl it over the precipice
of death; or, as the warrior who with rising hopes
has long withstood his foes, would see their reinforcements
come when his arm has lost its power,
so upon Nekumonta came the realization of the
struggle yet to come. But his brave heart failed
not, and bending over the shivering form of his
loved Shanewis, he said:

"Shanewis shall live. Let her fight the bad
spirits, and tell her brothers and sisters who call to
her that she cannot go to her long home for many
moons. Nekumonta has said it. He will find the
healing vines of the Great Spirit, and Shanewis
shall live."

The robe that covered the entrance of the lodge
was pushed aside, and the chief of the Mohawks
hurried away into the forest.

In many places the snows were not melted. The
roots were locked in their beds by the frost, and the
medicine herbs had not yet awakened from their
sleep. Running through the open fields, looking
anxiously among the rocks, crawling under the
fallen trees, hurrying with despair over the barren
hills, swimming the swollen streams and rivers,
darting along the shores of the half-frozen lakes,
penetrating the gloom of the forbidding forests,
stopping neither for rest nor for food, Nekumonta
searched, repeating again and again, until the woods
and fields were burdened with the words : " Shanewis
shall live! Nekumonta will find the healing
vines of the Great Spirit, and Shanewis shall live!"

Three suns had passed since he left his lodge,
and still his weary quest was in vain. Wherever
he looked only dead leaves and withered vines were
to be found. When darkness came and he could
no longer see, the anxious searcher had, on his
hands and knees, crept onward all the night, hoping
that his keen scent would discover what his sight
had failed to disclose during the day. At the decline
of the third sun, stumbling forward in the
gathering darkness, Nekumonta fell exhausted to
the earth and the Great Spirit touched his eyes with
sleep.

Then the dream-god came and Nekumonta saw
Shanewis lying sleepless on her couch of furs and
heard her calling his name gently and with tenderness.
He saw that the plague ran through her
veins like the fires that swept the forest when the
rustling leaves lay thick upon the ground. Then
he saw her creep to the door of the lodge and push
aside the robe that shut out the cold winds. Long
and earnestly she looked into the darkness, calling
him to hasten to her side. He reached forward to
clasp her in his arms, and the vision faded. Now
he was in his canoe, which the taunting spirits of
the plague were pushing down the river, and they
laughed and shouted in derision as he tried to catch
the medicine plants that grew in great abundance
along the shores. Again, he was with his loved
Shanewis in the cornfields, filling the great baskets
with roasting ears to be taken to the fires where
danced and sang the red men in honor of the ripening
harvest. Then the voices of the singers changed
into low and murmuring sounds, which finally grew
more distinct until Nekumonta heard the words:

"Strong and brave chief of the Mohawks, we
are the healing waters of the Great Spirit. Take
us from our prison and thy loved Shanewis shall
live."

Starting from his slumbers like an arrow from the
bow, Nekumonta cast off the dream-god and stood
in the first light of the smiling face of the Great
Spirit as he came from his wigwam to open the
new day. Swiftly his glance darted from side to
side, searching in vain every tree and bush, every
rock and stone for evidence of the presence of some
one who could have uttered the words that had
come so distinctly that they must be more than the
echo of a dream. The practiced eye and ear of the
hunter could discover nothing unusual in the forest,
though every faculty was awake, every nerve
strung to its greatest tension. With sadness and
loss of hope his attitude relaxed, and with heavy
footsteps he turned toward the hills.

And yet he could not go away. Something sent
him back to the little opening in the forest, and
when he reached the spot where he had fallen in
the darkness the night before he bent suddenly and
placed his ear to the ground.

What caused Nekumonta to leap to his feet with
a cry of triumph that rang over the hills like the
shout of many warriors ? What changed in an instant
the hopeless, dejected being who bent to the
earth, to a creature alert, with his hardened sinews
standing out upon his body in eagerness to expend
its stifled strength ? Faintly, yet distinctly, he had
again heard the murmuring voices:

''Strong and brave chief of the Mohawks, here
are the healing waters of the Great Spirit. Take us
from our prison and thy loved Shanewis shall live."

With a bound like that of the panther Nekumonta
sprang to the hillside, and from the trunk of a hardy
ash that had been felled by the lightning's bolt he
tore the toughened branches, bearing them in
triumph to the valley. Back he ran like the wind
and from the yielding soil dug armfuls of sharpedged
stones, which he bore with hurrying steps
to the place where a promise had been opened to
him greater than the one of the Happy Hunting-
Grounds. Not a moment did he pause, but the cry
of "Shanewis! Shanewis! Shanewis !" was almost
constantly on his lips.

The smiling face of the Great Spirit rose higher
in the path it followed for the day, and looked
down over the hill tops at the toiling Nekumonta.
Forcing the toughened limbs of the ash tree deep
into the ground he wrested from their beds the
huge bowlders that impeded his progress and
formed the prison of the healing waters. With the
sharp-edged stones he cut the hard earth, and with
torn and bleeding hands he hurled the rough soil
from the excavation. Like a very god incarnate
the dauntless spirit toiled—never resting, never
tiring, never stopping except at long intervals, when
he bent his ear to the earth. Each time he heard
the voices, swelling louder and louder, and repeating
over and over again the promise that lent him
an energy that could have torn the earth asunder
had it refused to yield its life-giving treasure for the
light of his wigwam.

When the smiling face of the Great Spirit had
reached the middle of its trail and turned once more
to the door of his great lodge, the tireless Nekumonta
leaped to the edge of the excavation with
renewed shouts of joy and triumph, and the woods
resounded with the laughter and songs proclaiming
that the imprisoning barrier had been broken open.
The sparkling, healing waters heard the welcome
voices in the woods, and rising from their dark
prison filled all the place the toiler had torn open in
the earth, and then ran merrily down the valley in
the sunlight.

Nekumonta bathed his bruised hands and burning
face in the grateful waters and then hurried away in
the forest. On and on he ran, with a step so light
that the dead leaves scarcely felt its touch, and
with a strength that laughed the wind to scorn.

His path was straight through the forest to the clay
banks where his people came in the moon of the
falling leaves and made the vessels in which they
cooked their corn and venison. Here his energy
was born anew, and with a skill that was marvelous
in its dexterity he fashioned a jar to contain
the healing waters. From its hiding place he
brought the fire stone, and the store of branches
collected by the old men and children at the last
moon of falling leaves furnished him a supply of
fuel. When the smiling face of the Great Spirit
entered the door of his wigwam in the west
Nekumonta took from the dying embers the perfected*
result*of his h*andiwo*rk.

******************

The warm winds, laden with hope and comfort,
stole gently through the forest and sang with gladness
of the death of winter. Life came once more
to the swaying branches of the trees, and the first
notes of the robins and blue birds thrilled the listening
air with a sweetness for which it had long
hungered. The second day of spring had dawned
on the home of the Mohawks—the village where
the gaunt figure of the awful plague had reveled in
a dance of death throughout the weary moons of
winter.

Suddenly a triumphant shout filled the air. The
hearts of weary watchers stood still with suspense,
fearing that the evil witches had once more returned
to taunt them of their helplessness. The plaguestricken
woke from their fitful sleep and called
piteously to the Manito. Once more the shout
arose—louder, clearer, more triumphant—a pealing
cry of victory from the strong and brave
Nekumonta.

Bearing aloft in his arms the vessel containing
the healing waters, Nekumonta burst from the
deeper gray of the forest like a flood of sunshine
and ran with steps as light as the warm winds
themselves to the darkened lodge of his loved
Shanewis. With the soft mosses he had caught
from the banks of the streams he soothed her
fevered form, and with draughts of the grateful
healing waters she was lured to returning health.

Thus the loved Shanewis came back from the
very borderland of the Happy Hunting-Grounds to
her home with the Mohawks.